PIETER MIOCH INTERVIEWS GO SEIGEN
Go Seigen is one of the greatest go players of all time.
Although he
is getting on in years, he is still active as commentator
and teacher.
Pieter Mioch had the privilege of being able to
interview him, and
uses the opportunity to illuminate at the same time a
slice of modern
go history.
Pieter, 31, has studied go at the local branch of the
Nihon Ki-in in
central Japan. He lives with his family in Kasugai City,
near Nagoya.
He is a steady contributor of articles about the Japanese
go scene for
the Dutch go association.
____________________________________________________________
On 26 June 1999, after two months of preparation,
telephone calls,
house calls, submission of personal details and so on, I
was able to
visit a living legend: Go Seigen. "He is one of three go
players who
will still be famous several hundred years from now. The
other two are
Dosaku (1677-1702) and Shusaku (1829-62)."
This is Mr. Teramoto, Go's manager, expressing an
opinion that is
accepted generally, not just in Japan. "Players such as
Cho Chikun and
Kobayashi Koichi, for example, will be quickly forgotten
when other
top players come and go. But Go Seigen has left too
great a trail in
the history of the game of go to be forgotten," the gold
bespectacled
manager goes on to explain.
With deep respect and a slight feeling that by shaking
hands with Go
Seigen I was sure to become two stones stronger, I began
the interview
with the father of modern go. Two and a half hours later
I was richer
by an especially fascinating experience, but also
thoroughly
bewildered.
Despite his 85 years, Go Seigen is still remarkably
energetic and,
after the first few minutes of the interview he
resolutely took the
reins in his hands. I was rushed at lightning speed on a
tour through
Chinese philosophy, various religions, Japanese and
Chinese culture,
experiences from his time before the war, and much
else. I have
therefore chosen to use material from Go's autobiography
"Ibun Kaiyu"
(published in 1997) as my lodestar.
Go Seigen is the Japanese pronunciation of the
Chinese name Wu
Qingyuan. In this article I will continue to stick with
the name Go
Seigen. Go was born on 19 May 1914 as the third son in a
family that
had earlier made a fortune in salt commerce. Go's father
was actually
an official and had merely a modest income. Because it
was a turbulent
time, things began to go downhill for Go's family after
he was born.
When it became apparent that Go's talent for go was so
special that
they could earn a healthy salary with it, this was
most welcome.
Go's father, who had enjoyed go lessons from Honinbo
Murase Shuho when
he was studying in Japan, passed away in 1925 when Go was
eleven years
old. Go was "discovered" a year later by Iwamoto Kaoru
when he was
visiting China. In 1928, Go came to Japan at the
invitation of Baron
Okura (a rich man who was behind the foundation of the
Nihon Ki-in)
and an important politician, minister Inukai Tsuyoshi.
When I asked Go
what he thought was the most memorable experience of his
career, he
answered without hesitation:

"The invitation to come to Japan from two of the top
people in
Japan. I am still very proud of the fact that these
important
figures in Japan came to ask a Chinese boy, would you
believe,
whether he wanted to come to Japan one day. Many people
do not know
that and think that I came to Japan off my own bat. I
came here at
the time as a guest, and several highly placed people
in the go
world, including Honinbo Shusai Meijin, came specially
to Tokyo to
welcome me."
When Go spoke of his arrival in Japan, his look became
noticeably
sharper. Although it is more than 70 years ago, he can
apparently
still recall the day like yesterday. "It was a vessel
of 2,500
tonnes on which we then came to Kobe, after which there
was a long
journey to Tokyo. We spent several days on it."
Immediately after Go arrived in Japan, he fulfilled the
high
expectations of him in spectacular fashion by winning
three games
in a row against established pros. Apart from Go
himself, this
surely must have been a relief for Segoe Kensaku, a top
Japanese
pro who was Go's teacher and who was held responsible
lock, stock
and barrel by Baron Okura for Go in the go world. The
pity was
that, because of his weak constitution, Go was forced
to take it
easy and his first year was not spent full-time.
In 1930 he started properly in the Oteai, the
professional grading
tournament and at the time the most important event.
His results
were frighteningly good, and anyone who had doubted his
talent
could now no longer do other than to admit that Go was
the most
sensational player of the moment. In 1932 he became
5-dan. By
today's standards that is not so special, but in those
days they
were not so lavish with promotions, and a 5-dan then
belonged to
the elite. There was only a handful of players with a
higher grade.
[33]Table of Go's Oteai results
In the period from 1930 to 1961, Go was a dominant
force in the go
world. But occasionally he had to take time out to
regain his
strength and then he played less. His health was not
robust, and
during and after the second world war he found himself
in a
difficult position because of his Chinese origins. It
is an
incontrovertible fact that Go, in a series of matches
over ten
games, proved to be the strongest go player in the
world. In
addition to his brilliant style of play, he is known
above all for
a series of novelties in the opening.

Another famous episode in the career of Go Seigen is his
game against
Honinbo Shusai. In order to make plain what was so
special about this
game, first a little bit of go history.
The start of professional go in Japan was
approximately
contemporaneous with the battle of Nieuwpoort, around
1600, and it
began with the Buddhist monk Nikkai. Nikkai was the first
head of the
Honinbo go school. In 1612, the authorities began
officially to
sponsor the four greatest go schools: Honinbo, Yasui,
Inoue and
Hayashi. The Honinbo school had the leading position,
thanks to the
overwhelming strength of Nikkai. In 1588 he was able
to win a
tournament organised by the government. It brought him a
fixed annual
income, paid by the Shogun.
The name Honinbo, incidentally, comes from a pavilion on
the land of a
temple in Kyoto where Nikkai lived. When the capital
was moved to
Tokyo in 1603, Nikkai had to go along. Once arrived
there, he made a
title of the name Honinbo and changed his name to Honinbo
Sansa. He is
best known by this name. In Tokyo he received an
established post and
he was, amongst other things, responsible for the
spread of go in
Japan. He took this very seriously. It is Honinbo Sansa
and his school
that Japan must thank a great deal for the level at which
go is played
at present.

The supremacy of the Honinbo school was off and
on in danger, but even
when the authorities stopped sponsoring go in 1868, the
Honinbo school
still supplied the strongest go players. This was in
spite of the
problems and reverses, the lack of income and
accommodation. It seems
that later there was talk of a certain sclerosis of
playing techniques
precisely because the Honinbo school always stood at the
top. Dogmas
arose: specific opening moves, for instance, were marked
down as good
or bad. Moves rejected by the Honinbo school normally
never appeared
on the board in professional games.
When Go arrived in Japan, the Honinbo school was still
the leader of
the go world. The prestige of the head of the school,
Honinbo Shusai,
was enormous - the more so because Shusai had acquired,
in addition to
the title of Honinbo, the highest possible of Meijin
(master). Through
his position, Shusai represented centuries of go wisdom
and tradition.
Go Seigen was unintentionally to be cast in the role of
braggart and
rebel - a role which by no means suits this especially
friendly and
mild-mannered man, and which he himself had never
knowingly sought.
The game between Go Seigen and Honinbo Shusai, which at
the time was
regarded by everyone (and by some still is) as the game
of the century
, began on 16 October 1933 and lasted almost three
months. The actual
playing time, the time that both participants actually
sat at the
board, was 14 days. the newspapers had considered that
it would be
good for circulation to publicise this game widely as a
confrontation
between Japan and China. As a result, Go was often
troubled by
nationalists and the windows of his house were
smashed in.
"I have never taken much part in politics or the like.
This was not
the first time that I was an accessory to events in which
emotions ran
very high." Go had to put up with this inimical
atmosphere for three
months. As nominally the stronger player, Shusai had the
privilege of
deciding whenever the game should be
adjourned.
Because, at the time, there was no sealing of moves, it
meant that the
player whose turn it was to move could continue to study
the position
leisurely at home. Shusai made shameless use of this
privilege. Thus
it came about that, at the resumption of play on the
eighth day,
Shusai played first, Go answered within two minutes, and
Shusai then
thought for three and a half hours, only to adjourn the
game. Go was
thus at a particular disadvantage.
It is therefore not surprising that, whenever the ideal
duration of a
game comes up for discussion, Go has a very forthright
opinion. A game
must, one way or another, be completed in one day. "Cho
Chikun lost
yesterday because he had selected a large-scale,
difficult joseki,"
said Go, by way of explanation. "That is precisely what
is wrong with
go in Japan today. They are too attached to corner
patterns (josekis).
Go ought to be played on the whole board. And why Cho is
using all is
time on one joseki in a game with three hours thinking
time is a
mystery to me."

Go's unorthodox style attracted much attention. He was
the darling of
the newspapers, which recorded top sales during the
match between Go
and Shusai. His opening move at 3-3 was unheard of for a
professional.
Go: "Everyone said a move on the 3-3 point was bad and
could not be
played. I simply did not understand that, and wanted to
see for myself
why it was supposed to be bad."
In the end, Shusai won the game by two points. But
there is yet
another remarkable story attached to the game. It is on
account of
White 1 in Diagram 1, a brilliant move that made a
significant
contribution to Shusai's victory. It was an open secret
that Go in
fact had to take on the whole Honinbo clique at the
same time.
Whenever Shusai had adjourned the game, he studied the
position with
his students to find the best move together.
The story is that White 1 in Diagram 1 was a brilliant
discovery by
one of Shusai's pupils: none other than Maeda Nobuaki,
who became
famous for his books on tsume-go (go problems). This
move, which at a
stroke brings White back into the game, was therefore
apparently not
thought of by Shusai himself.
Go's teacher, Segoe Kensaku, let drop years later,
according to what
he assumed was an "off-the-record" conversation in a bar,
that White 1
was a move by Maeda and not by Shusai. When this
pronouncement
appeared in a newspaper the next day, the whole Honinbo
school was
furious, and Segoe had to bear a very heavy burden.
Every day he
received threatening letters , and a band of supporters
of the Honinbo
school bent on revenge even posted themselves in front
of his house.
Eventually he had to give up his post on the board of
the Ki-in and
make a public apology.
"I am very sorry that there were some things I did not
realise until
later," said Go. " Honinbo Shusai and my teacher were
definitely not
bosom pals, but that went totally over my head."In an
interview in the
1980s, he said,"Only years later did I come to know
that Segoe had
made that statement, and that he therefore had to
endure so much."
The game to one side, Go had the following to say on
Shusai in the
interview: "Was Honinbo Shusai a villain? He was a
scoundrel! How the
Ki-in manages to deify this person of all people is
unbelievable!"
He goes quiet for a moment, then suddenly he
declares in a
surprisingly loud voice and with much agitation: "A
villain. He was a
villain! He is now praised to the skies by the Ki-in and
depicted as
one of the heroes of this century, yet - mark you well -
he sold his
title to the newspapers for mere lucre and bought with it
a fair-sized
piece of land in Tokyo without giving one cent to the
Ki-in or the go
world." And so he goes on...

In the thirties a periodical called "Selected
Games of Kitani Minoru"
was published monthly by the Japanese Go Association
(Nihon Ki-in).
One of the contributors to this was Kawabata Yasunari,
and he wrote
the following in an article "The early days of Shin
Fuseki."

"The period of Shin Fuseki was not only the period of
the early
days of two personable young men, Kitani Minoru and Go
Seigen. It
was without doubt also the period in which the
foundations of
modern go were laid. Shin Fuseki was the fresh wind
that fanned the
flames of enthusiastic, youthful creativity and
adventure.

Shin Fuseki ensured, through its glittering appearance
and
staggering, sparkling content, that the whole go world
underwent a
rejuvenation. It is without a doubt true that there
were among the
generation of Kitani and Go other brilliant players.
But among them
there were none who had had such a marked influence on
the go world
as the newcomers, Kitani and Go. During the period of
Shin Fuseki
they revived the go world. The new opening theory of
Kitani and Go
became the symbol of the blooming of go in the 20th
century."

Go: "I felt especially embarrassed by this fulsome text.
This does not
actually keep me from saying that the role Shin Fuseki
played in the
development of go today is well expressed in the above
piece. I do not
really think that go came to its highest possible level
because of
Shin Fuseki and the developments which it brought in
its train.
The 'new opening' period was only a step on the way to
the perfecting
of go. I myself am very curious about developments in
the 21st
century. As I have already said, go should be played
over the whole
board. In that respect Shin Fuseki was an ideal style to
stimulate the
creativity of players beyond fixed josekis (corner
patterns) and to
broaden understanding of the game."
Nowadays, the term Shin Fuseki is usually associated with
the style of
top pros such as Takemiya and Sonoda. Both often choose
to give up
territory to build influence. In such a style of play,
the stones are
thus more oriented towards the centre than the edge.
Because Shin
Fuseki normally signifies "new opening," we could say,
every time
there is a new trend in the opening, that this is also
Shin Fuseki.
What then is actually the difference between Shin Fuseki
and today's
new opening moves and trends? One difference is that Go
and Kitani
tackled things on a larger scale than happens today.
Opening moves on
hoshi (4-4) and tengen (10-10) were not new, but Go
turned these into
standard moves, as also with sanrensei (three handicap
points in a row
on one side). The opening move at 3-3, which is not
directed towards
influence, was actually also a revolutionary move in
Shin Fuseki.
When Go and Kitani demonstrated that it was possible to
win games with
less conventional moves, and even moves considered bad,
many pros
unhesitatingly followed them en masse. Opening moves
on 5-5,
10-6...suddenly any outrageous move one could think of
was worthy of
consideration and seen in actual play. The mode of play
which had its
beginnings with Kitani and Go had, at the time, an
enormous influence
on go-playing Japan. It was as if, for example, Cho
Chikun played his
first three moves in a title match at arbitrary points
on the second
line... and won!

In the first "wild years" everyone and his dog
tried Shin Fuseki
itself at least once, before the situation again cooled
down a little.
There had, it is true, always been a hard core of
players who fought
tooth and nail against Shin Fuseki and made their views
on this known
in books and newspapers. The point at issue died a
natural death.
There was plainly nothing ultimately wrong with the
traditional
opening moves from before Shin Fuseki. The opening
theories from the
19th century blended with the modern ideas from the
start. Go: "These
developments brought the game of go nothing but good,
and made the
game, if possible, more attractive. I see in this also
a fusion of
Chinese and Japanese go theory."
Figure 1 (1-20)
W: Go Seigen 5d vs. B: Kosugi Tei 4d, October
1933
W won without counting
Above is an example of how a game at the height of
Shin Fuseki's
popularity could develop. Go: "When I look at this
now, I do not
understand where I got the courage from to place such a
fantasy of an
opening on the board with such effrontery."
It is naturally not the case that Shin Fuseki was
suddenly discovered
and came out of the blue without anyone getting wind of
it. Several
years before the name became official, clear signs were
visible. Go:
"In the sixth year of Showa (1931), when I was 4-dan, I
played on the
3-3 point, and in the year after, when I had meanwhile
become 5-dan, I
played the nirensei opening (two moves on 4-4 on the same
side of the
board) in a number of games." This is the precursor of
the sanrensei
opening.

"Once I became 5-dan, the number of games in
which I had White
increased. At the time, there was no komi, and if the
old 3-4
josekis are insisted on, it is inevitable that White's
way of
playing is somewhat sluggish."
"The rule with josekis is that they should give a
locally equal
result, an exchange of moves whereby each player
obtains 50 per
cent. It is almost as if josekis are specially for
Black, who, on
account of the advantage of first move, naturally gets
the most
benefit from a tit-for-tat mode of play."
"One go player for whom I have much respect, Honinbo
Shuei Meijin
(1852-1907), very often played on hoshi with White.
This chimes
nicely with my way of playing, in which White must
develop quickly.
I was not satisfied with the slow way of playing based
on komoku
(3-4). The sansan (3-3) and hoshi (4-4) moves that I
played are
based on the idea of speed. They occupy the corner with
just one
move, whereas an asymmetrical corner move requires a
follow-up move
in order to secure the corner."
"It was and is a completely natural idea for me to put
more
emphasis on a quick development than on a corner
enclosure with a
shimari. Because it was actually at the time an
unwritten law to
play komoku and from there to enclose the corner with a
shimari, my
way of playing created something of a stir."

At the same time, when Go was beginning with his
unorthodox fuseki,
Kitani's style was characterised by low positioning of
his stones and
a rather orthodox way of playing. His results were
actually not
particularly convincing. The time was ripe to try
higher positions
oriented towards influence instead of low positions. It
was a period
of searching and experimenting with a style that
attached greater
weight than before to speed of development. In the spring
of 1933, Go
began a jubango with Kitani. It was during this match
that the Shin
Fuseki style of play came most plainly to the
fore.
Jubango is described as the hardest and most
debilitating form of
competitive go. A direct encounter between two rivals in
a match of at
most ten games, including jigos. The match could be
broken off if one
of the two players was promoted and the dan grade was
thus no longer
the same (formerly, it was unimaginable for pros in Japan
to play even
against a player of one lower dan grade...) or if one of
the players
was forced to accept a handicap by virtue of the fact
that he had
fallen four games behind. If this happened, it normally
betokened a
serious blow to the career of the losing
party.
Go's results in jubango are incredible. Imagine that in
Japan today
one player for more than two decades was able to
challenge players
such as Sakata Eio, Fujisawa Hideyuki, Cho Chikun,
Kobayashi Koichi
and Yoda Norimoto and, without exception, give them a
handicap! And as
if that were not enough, Go played by far the most of
these games in
his early years in Japan.
After the second world war, he played less often, by a
long chalk,
than the average pro. He was at this time very
preoccupied with
religion, specifically the Manji (Red Swastika)
movement. Go once
stopped General MacArthur's car on behalf of this
international
movement in order to hand over a folder. MacArthur
eventually took the
petition, but Go and his colleagues had to suffer
interrogation by the
police!

Did Go Seigen gradually become weaker or did he suddenly
stop playing
go? These are two good questions to which the answer is
not so well
known as you might think for a player of Go's stature.
With the
exception of the period during the second world war, Go's
career was a
model of stability. But in 1961, when he was 47, the
career of the
most sensational go player since Honinbo Shusaku came
to an abrupt
pause.
When Go, in August of that year, was in a rush and,
against his usual
custom, did not make use of a pedestrian crossing, he
was hit by a
motorcycle that came out of the shadows at high speed
while overtaking
a bus. Go was thrown up in the air, and then the same
motorcycle ran
hard into him once more, hitting him and dragging
him along.
Twenty minutes later, when Go came to in the hospital,
it seemed
initially as if all was well. Go took the doctor who
treated him at
his word when he told him that he would soon be back on
his feet.
Actually, his right leg began to swell up a few days
later and began
to ache even more. When at last it was decided to take
an x-ray, it
was apparent there had been a grave mistake.
Go later had a great deal of dizziness and nausea, but
that was not
diagnosed at the time. One year later he had to be
examined for a long
time for this reason.
Two months after the accident, Go was at last
discharged from the
hospital. The gravity of the accident and the quality of
the treatment
Go experienced left their mark. Go no longer properly
trusts western
medicine and goes instead twice a month to an
acupuncturist.
During Go's stay in the hospital, the Yomiuri newspaper
had moved
heaven and earth to interrupt the tournament for the
Meijin title.
This tournament was being played for the first time and
they wanted to
wait until Go was ready again. So just three months
after his
accident, Go sat behind the board, on a chair instead of
a cushion on
the floor, for the last game of the Meijin League. His
opponent was no
less than Sakata, a player who always gave Go a hard
time. When Go and
Sakata played each other, violent bare-knuckle fighting
games always
ensued; in terms of fighting spirit their games belong
with the best
of the 20th century.
Fujisawa Hideyuki, Sakata and Go all had 3 losses in
the Meijin
League. Fujisawa was actually in a clear lead and the
winner of the
Go-Sakata game was thus to play off against him in order
to decide who
was to be the first Meijin of the new era. With what
must have been
something of a superhuman effort by Go, he managed to
bring the game
to a jigo with White after all those watching had
written him off.
A jigo with White meant victory for Go, but Fujisawa was
declared the
Meijin without a playoff! Although both Go and Fujisawa
had scored
10-3, according to the rules Go's jigo was worth less
than a "normal"
victory.
After this episode, Go, because of his health, slowly
but surely had
to retire from the go world. Go still played, but in the
longer games
in particular he suffered the burden of dizziness and
nausea.
Go Seigen still holds study sessions to which top pros
such as O
Rissei and Michael Redmond come. He is searching for the
ideal way to
play in the 21st century. His most recent book is even
called "Go in
the 21st century."
After the interview I spoke further with Go's manager
Mr. Teramoto.
Teramoto: "The study meetings are pretty intensive. Go
continuously
tries different things and sometimes passes judgments
difficult to
comprehend. If we then, for example, go back a week
later, he quietly
says, 'Oh no, it is not at all true what I say, you
know.' He is for
ever on the move - standing still means going backwards
and Go will
never go backwards."
Pieter: "Is that so? What sort of things does Go sensei
say then?"
Teramoto: "The last time, Go often said that sanrensei as
we now know
it is actually the worst sanrensei that is
possible."
Pieter: "???"
Teramoto: "Much too concentrated on one side of the
board. This
(Diagram 2), according to Go, is the best sanrensei, and
No. 2 is this
formation (Diagram 3).
Diagram 2
Diagram 3

When I stood up at this point to return home, I luckily
realised that
the most important question had not yet been put. So I
said: "Go
sensei, do you have a final comment for the Dutch go
world?"
Go:

"Certainly. Not just for the Dutch go world but for
everyone in the
whole world. It is impossible to foretell where a great
new go
talent will emerge in the 21st century. That could be
anywhere,
thanks to the Internet and the knowledge that a game of
go is not
decided by josekis but by the insight and the power
that are
necessary to consider and keep considering the whole
board (this
subject was plainly Go's hobby horse throughout the
interview) and
to handle proper evaluation of the different positions.
As I said
earlier, go in Japan addresses itself too much to
corners and
josekis. The most important reason why China and Korea
were able to
surpass Japan is that they are not so preoccupied with
josekis.
They address themselves rather to the whole board, and
that is
precisely where things are happening, that is what will
be
characteristic of go in the 21st century!"